Latest News

NEW YORK, March 20, 2025 – Today, The Trevor Project launched a public awareness campaign to address the public health crisis of suicide among LGBTQ+ young people in rural communities with support from The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust. The campaign launch features a new 10-minute documentary short film that tells the story of a mother and…

NEW YORK, March 10, 2025 – The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust announced today a $1 million grant to the Jerusalem Foundation for the construction of a new center for Tsad Kadima, an organization in Jerusalem that works with youth and adults with disabilities. The grant will help develop the $6.7 million new home for Tsad Kadima that will serve…

RAPID CITY, SD, March 4, 2025 – The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust is granting more than $2 million to Monument Health Children’s to purchase state-of-the-art neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) equipment. This investment will allow newborns and their families to access critical care close to home.  The grant allows for the purchase of more than 20…

As HeartCorps service member Ayden Keslar offered blood pressure checks at a Gillette, Wyoming soup kitchen, she noticed a stressed-out mother tending to her baby and teenage child. Ayden invited the mom to take a seat and listened attentively as she shared how tough it was to carve out time to take care of herself with diet and exercise. This…

NEW YORK, February 18, 2025 – The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust today announced a $5.45 million grant to build a cutting-edge Medical Technologies Building at the Holon Institute of Technology (HIT) in Israel. Support from Helmsley is a critical step toward educating the next generation of healthcare professionals in the country. The money will serve as…

NEW YORK, February 10, 2025 – The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust (“Helmsley”) has announced a grant of $1.365M to Rambam Health Corporation for the purchase of an angiography system for the interventional radiology unit at Rambam Health Care Campus (“Rambam”). The center will use the new equipment in the treatment of trauma-related vascular injuries, such as…

Growing up in rural Indiana, Basil Heintzman saw first-hand the healthcare inequities faced by residents of smaller communities. When a family friend suffered a heart attack while toiling in a community garden, her dad decided to put him in his vehicle and rush him to the nearest large town, Bloomington, to get the care he needed to survive. The doctor…

Safe motherhood should not be a privilege enjoyed just by those in the global north or in urban centers; it is a part of health as a human right. Maternal deaths are largely preventable, and yet maternal health disparities remain a major challenge across the globe. After years of steady declines in global maternal mortality rates since 2000, progress stalled…

For the past 6 years, the Helmsley Charitable Trust has convened researchers of the Gut Cell Atlas Crohn’s Disease Consortium (GCA) to share their progress in cataloging cell types and their signals in the intestine of Crohn’s disease (CD) patients. By generating this searchable cellular atlas of diseased tissue – and comparing it to that of healthy tissue – researchers…

NEW YORK, January 15, 2025 – A new short film from the non-profit organization Healing Hands of Joy details the ongoing struggle to eradicate obstetric fistula, a severe childbirth injury, and end the suffering and stigma for thousands of women in conflict-torn Northern Ethiopia. The 11-minute production “Power of Joy,” funded in part through a $1 million grant from The Leona…

Crohn’s disease is an auto-inflammatory disorder that affects the gut. People with Crohn’s disease must manage chronic pain, fatigue, and severe complications, such as intestinal blockages and ulcers. The time taken to diagnose a person with Crohn’s disease is critical in preventing the development of more severe complications. Helmsley supports innovative research aimed at improving improves our understanding of the…

Since its debut in 2022, the KFF Health News Rural News Desk has consistently provided robust, factual journalism that has proven essential to exposing challenges, catalyzing solutions, and elevating voices too often unheard. The Helmsley Charitable Trust helped launch the initiative with a $3.9 million grant, and Helmsley is honored to continue this successful partnership with a $4.7 million grant…

At Helmsley, our Type 1 Diabetes Program is dedicated to helping the global type 1 diabetes (T1D) community live safer, better, and more fulfilling lives today while funding advancements in research and technology for a better tomorrow. A critical piece of achieving that ambitious goal is to improve access to continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) technology, which has revolutionized diabetes management…

After expanding our Rural Healthcare Program into two U.S. Pacific Territories, we added Hawaii as our ninth state. As our first grant in Hawaii, we granted $10.6 million to Wilcox Medical Center on Kauai for state-of-the-art diagnostic and radiology equipment. “The Helmsley Charitable Trust is thrilled to welcome Hawaii to our Rural Healthcare Program,” Helmsley Trustee Walter Panzirer said. “This…

“The Rural Health Care Crisis Is Growing.” “Why Rural America is Struggling to Access Specialty Healthcare.”  “America’s Rural Hospitals are on the Financial Knife Edge.” Every day, headlines like these recent examples perpetuate a false narrative about rural healthcare’s “impossible” problems. Every day, I ask myself: How can we show people just how many innovative solutions are born from this…